Bunny’s War on Mollywood

After drawing good openings for his film Julayi in AP, Karnataka and even abroad, Allu Arjun is now eyeing Mollywood. Ghaza Pokiri, the dubbed version of Julayi, will release there as an Id opening and will take on local superstars Mohanlal and Mammootty on their own turf...

The success of Julayi in Kerala, where it was sold for `1.2 crore, would be a hat-trick for Bunny after Arya 2 and Badrinath which collected more than `60 lakh and `1 crore respectively. The star, however, doesn’t want to be compared with Mohanlal and Mammootty and had stated recently that he had great respect for them.

However, with the Id release of Julayi’s Malayalam version, the actor will be taking on the superstars along with Dilip and Prithviraj. In fact, the film was held back by 10 days for its Mollywood release to attract the Id crowd. “We held back the Malayalam version for August 18 for Id which falls on August 19 or 20. The film will be released in many theatres since Allu Arjun’s fan following is growing there and the new generation of Malayalam movie buffs like his energetic performance and dancing abilities,” says a source.

“It’s true that Mammootty’s film Thappana will be releasing on August 20 along with those of other stars Dilip and Prithviraj, followed by Mohanlal’s Run Baby Run on August 28 for Onam. However, we are confident of drawing huge openings. Festival season is always the best time for releases,” says the source, adding, “The Telugu population in Kerala is negligible, so we dubbed our film and are trying to reach out to rural areas and grab more eyeballs.”

Till now, Malayalam stars would be wary of Tamil stars like Rajinikant, Suriya, Vijay and Ajith who are very popular in Kerala, but now it’s the turn of a Telugu star to take Mollywood by storm.